Red Riding Hunt
by literaryFRIVOLOUSneophyte
Summary: You are five years old when you meet your first friend. You decide to name him Slender Man, since Slender Friend sounds too simple. (Three chapters, complete)
1. Chapter 1

You are five years old when you meet your first friend.

Your knees are red with your clumsiness and your knuckles slippery from how many times you have wiped your eyes with them, but his hands are smooth slivers of marble that know the trails by heart. Which is a good thing, considering how your new friend found you alone on the side of a trail weeping.

You don't like being alone, and, when you are, it scares your heart to a halt. Your tear ducts function finely, however. You are ever so grateful for the fact that your new friend found you in time; panic would have probably set in after a few more minutes. Surely you would have begun straying off the trail in pursuit of Mom if he hadn't shown up.

He doesn't speak much - which means he doesn't comment on your tears and doesn't ask prodding questions - and this is a trait you admire. You don't ask him anything, either, and the two of you drift back onto the main trail. You would like to compliment his nice clothes, but the silence is too grand to interrupt.

Finally, around the corner, you spot your Mom's mess of tangled black hair (she's clutching her hideously pink purse to her chest, as though it serves as her life support) poking through a small crowd gathered around a sign describing the wildlife.

You look up to grin a sloppy grin at your friend, but he's gone. You don't take up time for confusion - although you do try to grasp if he ever told you his name or if you ever told him where you even needed to go - and run forward to Mom.

She isn't paying attention to the words on the sign but to a tall man with a wispy beard who looks absolutely exasperated. However, when you pull at her hair from behind her, she whips around and gives you a ghastly glare. In moments, you're swooped up in her plump arms. She mumbles a few strangled words to the trail ranger as you claw into a deeper embrace. A flash of relief, from either having finished with your mother or having seen the end to the conflict, crosses his frumpy face.

Already, you don't like the grumpy-looking man with the green uniform, but you have to deal with him for the next year of your life after he and your mother start dating. You don't think he likes Mom that much (or you, for he seems to especially despise you), but she doesn't believe you when you complain about him. She tells him she loves you and him every morning; he grunts.

Oh, and you don't see your first friend for a few months. On your first day of elementary school, he calms you down in the bathroom when you run away from a big girl who likes ugly words. He holds your hand again as you shiver on the toilet seat, your face buried in the wrinkles of your plaid dress. You neglect to ask him if he's a student here or a teacher, but you enjoy his company until you open your stall door and turn around to his disappearance.

You think he's a teacher, as he's way too tall to be a student, but you can't describe him to your Mom. She gets concerned about your friend being in the girl's bathroom with you, so you decide to lie and say he's your imaginary friend. (Her suspicion remains dormant for years with this excuse.)

"A not real man. Invisible, too. Tall and skinny! Unlike yoooou," you taunt. She gives a fake gasp and swats you with her hand. You giggle as she yells after you, "No difference between a slender friend and your big mother here!"

Then, Grumpy Boyfriend who Blames the Economy on the Fact that he Refuses to Propose comes home and you hide underneath your bed when Mom starts to talk loud with him over stupid things.

You call him your Slender Man from then on. Slender Friend sounds too simple to you.

It's a few weeks, this time, when you see your first friend again. Grumpy had gotten sick of you calling him Grumpy, so you crawled out of your window and to the trails. Even though Grumpy works at the trails, you like the trees and the wood planks and the funny little signs with big science words on them. While pronouncing some bush names to yourself, Slender Man finds you.

You don't grin at him this time; that would probably be mean. He doesn't move his face very much, so you think he doesn't have a mouth. (Do you even look at his face? Can you?) And so you won't brag about your teeth (they're yellow and food gets stuck in them, but you're real proud of your teeth). Instead, you hold his hand and tell him his new name.

Somehow, you end up telling him about Grumpy. You squeeze his solidly cold hands as you describe how loud whiskey can make him and how rude the night makes him. Slender Man listens as you tell him your theory that Grumpy is a werewolf. After all, Mom always gets scared when Grumpy comes home late. She doesn't tell you the details, but you think she has to deal with a big, lumbering wolf every night. No wonder she is so tired!

When you come home, Mom screams at you. You don't like loud voices and try to sneak under your bed, but she catches you and swats you - not nicely, this time. When you scream back at her, she apologizes, but you keep screaming. She sets you down - and you bolt towards the door. She says something incoherent as you pad down the street. Tonight, you don't want to endure Grumpy's werewolf disease. You just really hate loud voices.

Slender Man finds you back at the trails, and you spend the night knowing he's protecting the tree you're sleeping in. He stands below, and, although you don't know which direction he's facing due to his lack of facial distinction, you comfort yourself with his presence.

However, a sharp smell slaps you awake in the yawns of a morning. The sun is barely up, but there's red everywhere. There's flames eating their way up the tree you're in. You don't notice the fact that your tree is the only tree burning so far.

You don't make a sound, as if the fire will hear you. Mom always said she didn't like your silence, but you don't like voices in general. Mom's voice can be soft but raspy, just like her sobs. And Grumpy's is too much like that of a dog, an old, musky dog that claims to be human. And the fire slowly drags up the tree to the ragged blue of your shoes with a grumbling hiss of hunger.

You don't remember when you decided to jump, but you're in the air and you're falling without a single shriek. You land on something indistinct and watery, less solid than ground but definitely not made of air. From there, you practically float to the floor with a soft OOF as you jerk out of the mass of substance. Turning on your side, you look up at your friend. He must have saved you! (Did you fall through him? You should probably apologize for that.)

But you don't have time for that, as soon the sight of the burning trails is replaced by the street outside your house. (When did you get here?) There's loud cars with blinking lights on their roofs parked outside; you recognize these black and white vehicles as the police. Just as you get up, one of the multiple people standing near someone who looks a lot like your Mom but (a lot more sodden-looking) comes over to you and picks you up in your arms.

Mom doesn't say anything as you takes you into her hug. The wretched whisper of her weeping vibrates against you. It's one of those soft sobs you despise even more than her normal, violent ones. It sounds of guilty relief and confused sorrow.

You refuse to tell the police about Slender Man and the trails, although you do find out later from Mom's newspapers that the entire section of the trail you spent the night in had been burned down. The police aren't very interested in your story, though, but more on your Mom.

Grumpy doesn't show up anymore. You're relieved by this fact, but Mom isn't. One day, when you finally go back to elementary school after the commotion, she goes to hand you your lunch before pulling back and saying, "Greg's gone somewhere."

"Where has Grumpy gone?" you ask. You have the sandwich bag in your hand, but Mom won't let go.

She doesn't even frown at the usage of that nickname. "He won't be coming back."

You make a she remains vague.

"You wouldn't understand," she states. You pull a more dramatic face,

"I'm not stupid. I know things, too."

A flutter of a smile dashes on her dry lips. She licks it off with an even dryer tongue. "I went out to find you before Greg got home."

You don't interrupt her with an apology as she goes on, "A bad man came to our house while Greg was…alone here."

"Ooooh," you say, "Like a villain. A villain kidnapped Greg?"

"Yes." Mom looks at you with a twinge of something in her eyes. "Yes, of course. He…kidnapped Greg."

"Don't go after the villain! He's always got a trick!"

"No, of course not, honey…I couldn't go after the bad man, anyway."

"I don't want Grumpy back, either."

"Don't say that! And I would get Greg back if I could, you know, It's just…"

"Oh. You should just say he's dead, Mom. Grumpy is dead because of a bad man, and I have to go to school."

Mom stares at you. Her fingers twitch.

She releases your lunch and sighs.

Slender Man holds your hand in the bathroom again when you get in trouble for saying that the big girl should be killed by a bad man, too.


	2. Chapter 2

You are eleven years old when you meet your second friend.

Her hair is a bird's nest of red feathers, and her bangs hang down over your shoulder as you sob quietly in her grip. Even Mom's hair can't compare to the wild fortress of your friend's ginger mess. You don't even know her name yet, but she's friendly and doesn't say anything. Her eyes make you think of the fire that night you spend in the trail.

Anastasia and her ugly words have followed you from elementary school into middle school. Maybe rhyming your name with banana takes off the shame she feels for her own out-dated name. But when your new friend arrives in the midst of Anastasia and her group, the kids scatter/

"Witch! Witch!" they shriek as they launch pebbles in her direction. Her eyes, unwavering and practically glowing, watch them abscond to the other side of the playground. Are they scared of your new friend?

"Felicia will eat ya!" they giggle off in the distance. But whenever she makes eye contact with one of them, they silence.

Felicia? You look up at the girl holding you. She puts her finger to her lips but doesn't make a sound. You close your eyes and breath out a light laugh.

"They think you're a witch just 'cause you got pretty eyes?" you ask her. She smiles, and you give her your own yellowed grin.

You like Felicia. She's pretty, even if others think she isn't just because she can't speak. Anastasia relentlessly follows the two of you to high school, taunting you with a new word instead of "Banana Anna!" and "Felicia will eat ya!" They now call you "faggot," and the rage your Mom feels when you come home with that word in your head actually cheers you up. Oh, Mom despises how Anastasia and the others treat you and Felicia, but the school doesn't do much about it. And since Mom hasn't dated since Greg, she tries so hard all on her own. Mom, Felicia, and Slender Man keep your head up over the years.

You tell Felicia about Slender Man one day in the corpse of the tree you slept in the night of Greg's death. She doesn't mock you, although she asks a lot about the fire. (You've learned how to communicate with her through your hands. You actually prefer Sign Language over rusty English.) The fact that she has belief in the Slender Man, though, makes you kiss her while she speaks.

Your first kiss is harsh and dry, but Felicia kisses you back. After you break apart, Felicia and you sit for a while in the afterglow. You both had your first kiss and you both feel incredibly enlightened.

Mom notices when you come home. "You kissed her, didn't you?" All you do is smile and nod in reply. A wonderful expression lights upon her face, and she wraps you up in her arms. "Oh, that's my girl! I've been wondering when you would!"

But it gets worse at school. Felicia cries in your arms when Anastasia throws her food all over your dress, and you begin to truly hate the kids you go to school with. Felicia's tears are the worst thing you have ever _not_ heard, because they are full of silent sadness that never screams. For once, you wish for loud voices. You scream at Anastasia for her, and you get in trouble.

Of course, the counselor doesn't deal with Anastasia. He tells you that you have anger issues, are too sensitive to the outside world, that you need to calm down and stop acting out...and you let yourself hate him, too, in just one session.

He doesn't see Slender Man standing outside the imprisoning room's barred window. He doesn't understand your secret smile. You think he's scared of you, now.

After school, you don't wait for Felicia. You walk to the trails, knowing Slender Man will be there, too. You want to speak with him before Felicia finds you.

He's waiting at the tree of memories. Over scorch marks, there's a heart with the initials F and A scrawled inside.

"You killed Greg," you say. You don't look Slender Man in the face; you haven't since the day he brought you back to Mom. "I know it was you."

Not a whisper from Slender Man. But the wind sighs ahead, the sky paling with pink. There's no one on the trails except you and your first friend.

"I want you to kill Anastasia."

You find yourself thankful that you didn't stay the night on the trails, as another fire starts up in the same section. You smile at the mirror in the morning and brush back your black curls - nothing like Mom's. But your skin is as dark as Mom's and barely blemished by the sun. There's nothing vibrant about your appearance; Felicia has passionate facial features, as bright as fire itself.

And by next week, the news is on fire, too.


	3. Chapter 3

You don't have any other friends.

There are only four people in your life you would call your friends, although one of them is your imaginary friend from elementary school and another deceased for three months. And another is your mother.

It took you years to warm up to your therapist, but you consider Rory your close friend. You stopped attending serious sessions with him quite a while ago; you kept up contact, though. You don't mind the fact that Rory only thought of you as an acquaintance up to three days before his accident. On Christmas Eve, he called you up drunk, and you took the role of a therapist, this time. He apologized thoroughly for "dumping his problems on a patient" the next day, but you told him not to regret it. You like the bond that developed between the two of you before Rory's car was found abandoned outside the entrance to the trails and his body hanging limp in your tree.

You dream too much of dialing 911 on the phone in your hand. Felicia holds you during your nightmares, and the jolts of paranoia underneath your skin seem to electrocute her. You will never forget the pelting slap of the rain on your face as you told some stranger safe in their location - "My friend has been killed. Rory Winchester. Evansville Nature Trails."

The nightmares mainly consist of your own voice ringing so solid against the angst. His car was a wonderful piece of shit that he bought with his own money in high school, but his girlfriend sold it after the funeral. You never attended the funeral because you weren't invited. His wife didn't even know your name.

You know Rory Winchester's name and the eulogy on his grave like you have it written on the back of your hand. Which you did when you found out about his funeral. Felicia wrapped your scars in her hands and kissed your wounds with bandages. God, you love that woman. She loves you even in your self-hatred.

And even when you come home from your crappy job and stand outside the apartment for hours - Felicia loves you. You don't remember the time passing, but she later tells you that you came busting into the house raving about how you're on fire. Even Rory didn't know where the fire came into your subconsciousness.

You stopped believing in coincidences years ago before you lost yourself to insanity. And you stopped believing in imaginary friends, but that didn't stop the appearances of Slender Man throughout your adulthood. Of course, your third friend on your list has consistently calmed you down with her constant care.

Still, you haven't stepped a foot in the trails since you moved out of Mom's house and into your own with Felicia.

There are four people you have trusted entirely with your emotions since your life began thirty-three years ago. Rory is dead, and your Mom is halfway across the country in her own graveyard, now. And the second before last is the reason behind the diagnoses throughout the years as well as an on and off relationship with your last and best friend. But Felicia stays even with Slender Man's occurrences.

You aren't one for romance, but you tried hard for your wedding, since Mom wouldn't be there to help. You are a corny fool, and Felicia loves you.

The bed is flat and drab. But you are spending your wedding night in Felicia's strength and you have never felt happier.

That is, until she removes herself from your embrace to stare back into your eyes and whisper, "I know it was you."

You scan her face. "What do you mean?" The voices trickle softly in the gray of the room as you shuffle underneath the blankets to regain the previous position. However, Felicia pushes herself up on her elbows, her brilliantly bold hair shading her body, to stare back at you.

"I know you killed Anastasia."

There's rain against the window. Admittedly, it must have been a terrible idea to get married in the winter, but you and Felicia were eager for marriage. You'd been living together for years, anyway.

The somber weather reminds you of Rory and the trails. Which forces you to recall Slender Man, too.

"I love you, Anna. I knew it was you that killed Anastasia when you left me at school. But I love you, still," she repeats.

You don't understand. Where is this coming from? Anastasia was found dead outside Evansville's limits during your freshmen year of high school. That was _years_ ago.

"Felicia..." you mumble, reaching out for her bare shoulder.

Slender Man stands in the bathroom doorway.

Your wife's jaw goes slack when you whisper her name again. Something flickers in her illuminated eyes, and she pushes backward against your touch. She hasn't seen Slender Man once in your years together; she's never reacted to his appearance.

She's scared. But she's looking at you - not behind her, where Slender Man stands.

She only moves farther away when you call out to her (louder this time). Pushing away, she falls to the floor, crying out. You leap upwards...the last time you trusted Slender Man was your freshmen year. Ever since, you've been terrified of his existence in your life.

Felicia looks at you as though she can see Slender Man reflected in your pupils.

From the doorway, Slender Man...twitches. It's a vague movement, unsure, unsteady, unrelated.

You can't help but notice Slender Man's suit of such a slender color - something so sure compared to the rest of his being, something one would wear to a funeral if they had actually been invited, or something a person who isn't a "Banana Anna" would don - as he murders your wife in front of you.

Clutching the blankets to your chest, you rise off the bed. Prickly red carpet composes the floor of your apartment, and it itches against your feet as you pad over the fleeting corpse of Felicia to the bathroom.

Not a sound, not a breath, not a whimper, not a droplet of rain against the window or blood against a body.

One white wedding gown sleeps in the bronze chair placed in the corner of the room. You wore a suit to the wedding; you stopped enjoying dresses after high school. Before bed, you had your suit next to Felicia's dress. But it's gone now and you don't want to look down to see if you're wearing it.

Your skin shivers against the cold touch of the mirror. Your nails drag lines of Felicia down the glass with a softening shudder. With your fingers, you cross out your eyes in the reflection - you don't want to see it. In quivering movements, you lift up your hands to your face. Slender puddles of blood slide down your cheek as you prod the area beneath your eyes. Lines the color of purple reveal the insomnia, the nightmares, the mirrors in your murders.

The air is on fire.

You cross out your eyes with your fingernails, too. Now you can't decipher between Felicia's blood and your own. Red feels the same without color to go along with it. Or vision to perceive it.

Now you don't have to look at your eyes without eyes.

But the rain is back in your ears, pitter-pattering down through leaves and onto memories.

The trails are on fire.

Everything is so, so red to your monochrome design. You are black and white on the burning background of noise. You hate noise. You hate noise. You hate noise.

Your skin is on fire. All your friends are dead.

You won't be there for the funeral, either.

* * *

AUTHOR'S NOTE : I will most likely be editing the previous chapters of this fic now that I have finished it, but I will be transitioning more of my workload onto "Where the Wild Things Aren't." Thank you for reading!


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